“Suenen’s progress has been thrilling to watch—I've been following him since my student days—and the wines reviewed here are the finest I've seen to date from this immensely promising talent. Readers will find much to admire.” William Kelley, The Wine Advocate A wave of young, talented growers is blowing through every corner of Champagne, each intent on lifting their parcels to ever greater heights. You know the names we are talking about. Of these terroir-obsessed growers none, in our opinion, is delivering more precision, purity and intense minerality than Aurélien Suenen. We detail on our website how this young man has systematically transformed his family’s once conventional Côte des Blancs estate into one of Champagne’s brightest stars. In brief, Aurélien has spared nothing to get where he is today. To call him meticulous would be an understatement. Certified organic since 2019, Aurélien cultivates by hand and horse and uses cover crops and organic composts to nourish the life in the soil and increase soil biodiversity. He works closely with his friend, vineyard soil specialist Emmanuel Bourguignon, to further understand the nuances of his terroirs. You can view the extensive results of their collaboration in the linked wine notes below. This offering includes two village blends and three single-climat vintage wines. Aurélien’s decision to bottle his Oiry vineyards separately speaks volumes for this terrific, previously unseen Grand Cru terroir. Indeed, Suenen’s bottlings from this village are currently the only pure Oiry wines on the market. And while the Oiry cuvée is all about tension, stony density and salinity, Suenen’s C + C cuvée blends the texture and flesh of Cramant with the ripe opulence of the domaine’s south-facing Chouilly vines to derive something more hedonistic. Both wines are superb, underpinned by the mineral, chalky freshness that is one of this grower’s hallmarks. Then there are three standout, single-vineyard vintage releases from each of the three Grand Cru villages mentioned above. This is a producer who, after very few years, is producing arguably the most mineral wines of the Côte des Blancs. They stand up to the best that Champagne has to offer, and might more aptly be compared with the very finest Chablis!